A second clutch

On Saturday evening, at a quarter past nine, I saw the female digging a nest. She was very well hidden among the bindweed and I didn't see her at the first glance.

I found her thanks to the little movements she made. Under the arrow you can see one little yellow spot.

Last year she made a nest in the same place. Here the soil is mixed with fine sand. Some weeks ago she did it on the other side of the pond, in very hard soil.

A picture from another side.

The fist egg

The third egg

She is gently putting them in place

Covering the nest

By midnight she was back to the water and the nest was completely covered.

She has repeated last summer clutches: a first one of 4 eggs and a second one of 3 eggs.

This time I have put one egg in a Jaeguer incubator at 26ºC and another egg in a home made incubator like the one I described in the first clutch (aquarium heater), at 30ºC.

Now I have eggs incubated for female in both type of incubators. The same for eggs incubated for male. I will be able to compare both types.

I have left the third egg in the nest. Very close to it, in the space left by one of the eggs that I collected, I put a data logger to measure the temperature every hour for all the incubation.  The only  intervention that I will make is watering the ground if it is very dry and protect the nest with a wire mesh.